"The Germans moved, but they did not attack the French coast, our reconnaissance planes have searched all the sea areas within 700 kilometers of the French coastline, and have not found any traces of the fleet, and our submarines have also searched at the predetermined location and have not found targets, the other side is such a large fleet, if they come, we can definitely find them." When the Americans found out that the Allied fleet had finally left the Mediterranean, the attention of the entire Entente top brass was diverted to the sea, and even the land battlefield, which was becoming increasingly erosive! The top of the Entente saw an opportunity, an opportunity to reverse the decline of the battlefield. "As long as the Allied fleet dares to appear off the coast of France, our fleet and air force have every chance to inflict heavy damage on the adversary, and this is a golden opportunity, and the arrogant Germans will have to pay the price!" After Churchill got the news, his first reaction was how to kill his opponent, and in order to realize this plan, the British gritted their teeth and took out a batch of Mosquito bombers and Spitfire 9 fighters from their own stocks and sent them to France.

The Allied intelligence agencies began to work at high speed, delivering information collected on the Allied fleet to Nimitz and Pound almost every six hours. However, 3 days have passed, and not a single large warship of the Central Powers has appeared off the coast of France, which makes Nimitz and others scratch their heads, what tricks are the Germans playing? However, during this period of time, the Americans did not forget to continue to strengthen their fleet strength, and to the surprise of the Germans, a tactical victory in Richthofen Jr. actually made the air defense combat effectiveness of the Allied aircraft carrier formations rise instead of falling!

"We now lack enough fighters, we lost a lot of Hellcat fighters in the previous stage of fighting, and the domestic industry has reduced the production capacity of Hellcat in order to ensure the supply of the air force, after the first battle in Lisbon, our already stretched stocks have bottomed out, and in this moment of crisis, I hope that the British Empire will take its due responsibility." When the Entente fleet was just beginning to be repaired, Nimitz specifically discussed with the British the issue of replenishment of carrier-based aircraft. In this plane, even the deep-pocketed United States is a little overwhelmed. The long distance and huge battlefield attrition made the Americans a little weak to follow!

This is also considered Hellcat's bad luck, the engine used in the F6F fighter and the current popular P47 in the US Air Force are different sub-models of the same engine. are all R2800 engines, the latter as the backbone of the resistance to the Luftwaffe offensive is naturally very huge, and compared to the Hellcat who can't do anything, the P47 fighter can at least ensure that at the medium altitude and the FW190A fighter fight. It can still occupy a certain advantage at high altitude, and the F6F fighter can't play the opponent from low altitude to high altitude, if it weren't for the P47 being too heavy and too big, the Navy would want to change to P47! With the tense situation in the air, the Americans can only compress the Hellcat in order to ensure the production capacity of the P47! And this compression doesn't matter. After a big war, the Americans found themselves not enough carrier-based fighters! And it was at this time that the German fleet came out!

So, the Americans, who have always been helpers, set their sights on the British, meaning, no matter what, you have to fill this gap for me, everyone is a grasshopper on a rope, and the German bombers will not only bomb the Americans but not the British! In any case, both Spitfire 5 and Spitfire 9 have a ship-based version. Especially the latter, although the Spitfire 9 fighter in this plane has similar performance to the historical one, it was considered to be on board before the development of the ship, and if you want to change it to a carrier-based aircraft, you only need to add a landing hook, and it can be picked up in a few hours. Of course, there is one more willingness that Nimitz did not say, and that is that the performance of the Spitfire 9 is simply fantastic! The excellent engine and good aerodynamic shape make the Spitfire 9 completely comparable to the German FW190 fighter, and because of the better horizontal maneuverability, the Spitfire 9's tactical options are more diverse. According to the words of the American pilots who flew the Spitfire, the Spitfire 9 fighter could sling Hellcat at almost any height. And whether it is BZ or circling, it must be the fat cat who loses in the end!

"We can replenish only 200 carrier-based aircraft at most, and it is impossible to have more, plus these aircraft. Our Spitfire 9 has about 500 units in the entire Entente fleet, which is almost a quarter of the fleet aviation! Almost half of the fighters are supplied by us. And these planes are enough to compensate for the losses of the previous stage of air battles, and more importantly, the only thing that the whole of Britain can take out now is these Spitfire-9! Pound replied that the British were not as generous as the Americans, and more importantly. In the eyes of the British leadership, France has a 70% chance of defeat, and if France is finished, then Britain, for their own safety, the British are not willing to give away all the small number of elite aircraft and pilots.

"It's all this time, and you're still telling me this? For the sake of Europe's security, and in order to prevent the fall of the British Isles, the United States of America has hit almost all its fleet, and we have provided a lot of assistance to your country, and even all the carrier-based attack aircraft on your aircraft carriers are provided by us! It was our TBD and SBD that replaced the obsolete Swordfish that you had used for more than twenty years! And now, your country has only provided only two wings of Spitfire-9 fighters. I would love to ask, if we lose this war completely, then even if your country has 400 planes! And what about 800 Spitfire-9 fighters? As soon as Nimitz heard Pound's words, he immediately became angry! Because of the range of the Spitfire tragedy, it was the Hellcat fighters who provided cover for several ground attacks, and this was the root cause of the huge increase in Hellcat losses. Nimitz will definitely not allow his own aircraft carrier to go to war with an empty hangar! So, this time, even if he tears his face, he will get enough planes from the British, and then fill the hangars of American aircraft carriers!

"Even the French, they have transferred 1 fleet aircraft carrier and 1 medium aircraft carrier from their precious search fleet to join the combined fleet of the Entente, and now in addition to the 2 French fleet aircraft carriers in the South Atlantic, almost the entire French Navy has joined our big family, and the French have almost pressed everything on them, and your country wants to take only 200 Spitfires to deal with the request for help from its allies, which is extremely wrong and even dangerous!" Nimitz quietly added some ingredients again! This is the news that Nizmi has just received, and this afternoon, the commander of the French Navy, Admiral Darlan, suddenly informed the Americans that in two days a French detachment would return from the South Atlantic and arrive in the French coastal waters, hoping that the American fleet would be able to pick it up. And this news made Nimitz overjoyed!

Although Darlan remained dissatisfied with the actions of the Americans in favor of the British some time ago, although he had the idea of saving the French fleet, when the Allied fleet was heavily damaged. When the Allied fleet was about to fight out of the Mediterranean, he was keenly aware that the war had entered a critical moment! Whether France can be saved may depend on the outcome of this future war, and if the Allied fleet wins, then the Allied sea lines will be guaranteed to be unblocked. The French will be able to get more support, and they will even be able to wait until the Chinese reinforcements arrive in Europe, and if they lose, I am afraid that the whole of Europe will tremble at the feet of the Germans!

Of course, the French, who were already on the edge of the cliff, did not put all their treasures on the United States and Britain. They had done enough for the Entente, using their homeland as a battlefield. Millions of French troops formed the first line of defense against the invaders. After months of war, the French finally realized that the United States and Britain could not solve all problems, not even stop the Allied armies from wreaking havoc on France itself, Britain was no longer the empire that was once formidable, and the United States was too far away from Europe! Faced with a victory that had already become somewhat illusory, the French learned to bet on both sides from the Italians, and of course, their choice would not be the Allies, but another country that was out of the way, but ready to join the war of the century.

"The British have turned into vassals of the Americans. This is not the so-called homogeneity. Rather, because of interests, the last fig leaf of the British Empire and the only basis for supporting the empire were India, and only the Americans were willing to help protect this vital colony. I don't think China would be willing to let the British continue to own the colony after the war, at least reduce it. We are different in France, our core interests are in North Africa, whether it is Annam in the Far East or other places are actually part of the discard, we have no conflict of interest with China, and if there is a new core of power in Europe after the war, it must be France and Italy, and this result is acceptable to China. So we also have the basis for cooperation with Huaxia. I will give most of the fleet to the United States and Britain, but we will always have to leave ourselves a way back. At an internal meeting, Dar Lang, as the head of the navy, explained his plans to the wartime cabinet in this way, and the remaining two aircraft carriers and a large amount of precious metals belonging to the French state were prepared for this back road!

This plan was actually launched a long time ago. The French government and the Chinese government have liaison, and the final fate of these fleets will belong to the French government like the Italian fleet that stayed in China before, but they must be included in the command system of the Chinese fleet, and the precious metals shipped to China are still the property of the French government, and Huaxia promised to return the full amount after the war, but how to operate during the period will be decided by Huaxia itself. The equipment needed for the French army trained and armed in China was provided by China. The funds for the purchase of these supplies and equipment are deducted from French assets abroad.

The negotiation process went very smoothly, and Huaxia also believed that Italy's energy could at most be an important country in Europe, and such a country would not be able to represent Huaxia's interests in Europe after Germany's decline, so Huaxia also needed a new ally, and a country like France, which was not high, was very suitable as a friend, after all, Huaxia and France were too far away, and even if Huaxia controlled the Middle East, it would not directly intervene in European affairs. So Huaxia finally agreed to this plan and gave quite a lot of preferential conditions!

The British didn't seem to expect the French to be so desperate, and when Nimitz dropped such a bombshell, Pound was also stunned. "The French provided aircraft carriers, but the D520 fighters on it are really limited in performance, and the United States provides attack aircraft and pilots, how about your country providing fighters? Don't deal with us with any Spitfire 5, I need Spitfire 9, and if we can't penetrate the opponent's defenses, we just need to be able to resist the opponent's attack! Nimitz said that this is the bottom line of the Americans, and if the British do not agree, I am afraid that something unpleasant will happen in some other ways.

"Okay, 200 Spitfires, plus all the fighters on the French aircraft carriers, plus the 300 Spitfires that we provided earlier, if I'm not mistaken, that's a total of 700 Spitfires! Is it okay? Eventually, the British relented, and they were forced to bleed out of their little coffers one more time. The Spitfire-9 fighters, which were intended to be the backbone of the homeland's defense, were pulled out quite a bit, a full 700 units! accounted for about a third of the number of aircraft carrier-based aircraft in the entire Entente fleet!

"Well, at least for now, our fighters will not be much worse than the Germans." Nimitz said to Fletcher next to him as he left.

"No, we're still a lot close, the Spitfire 9 is a good fighter, but the range is too short, even with the drop tank. So our attack range is a lot shorter. And the Spitfire 9 cannot be used as an attack aircraft, according to my observation, the number of FW190 aircraft in the German fleet should be about 7 percent, and many troops with attack aircraft numbers are actually equipped with this kind of fighters, they are attack aircraft when they hang bombs, and they are fighters when they throw away loads. This flexible combination allows them to change their tactics. If you talk purely about air combat performance, maybe the Spitfire 9 is indeed superior, but if you talk about comprehensive performance, I still think that the FW190A is more powerful. Fletcher thought for a moment and said.

"So you know the inference is that our odds are still not very good this time, is that right?" Nimitz paused, then motioned for Fletcher to follow him without waiting for an answer, and a few minutes later they returned to Nimitz's office. Nimitz didn't call anyone else, just the two of them in the room.

"Our goal in this engagement was to make the Germans feel pain, and then let them retreat to the Mediterranean, I didn't expect to win this engagement, and I was even prepared for tactical defeat. Now I need you to refine our plan to minimize our losses as much as possible. Nimitz said.

Thanks to the book friend zhouyu1976 for the tip~~~. (To be continued.) )